There's a whole lot going on in our music classroom - sometimes it can be a challenge to keep up! Check out some highlights from this week: Fourth Grade continued our learning from last week about Keemo (a game) by exploring the rhythms for "Sausage in the pan, sausage in the pan, sizzle sizzle sizzle sizzle, sausage in the pan!" We connected our rhythms to our learning about musical canons and then added movement! Second Grade took a song we knew from before and added movement - a dance! A long time ago (although as recently as 1950), dancing was banned in many spaces since it was "improper." Instead, creative thinkers called gatherings "play parties" and danced however they wanted to. Our second graders learned some common play party moves and put them together with folk songs that we've recently learned.
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Old Brass Wagon is a long-time staple of the music curriculum because it is a great way to teach the "tikatika ta" pattern. However, one of our fourth grade classes decided that the term "Brass Wagon" was way too outdated and needed a refresh! See their changes below and stay tuned for our next post to see a video of them in action! Circle to the left, old fast dragon,
Circle to the left, old fast dragon, Circle to the left, old fast dragon, You're the one, my darling! Other verses: Circle to the right... Everybody in... Everybody out... Student-suggested verses: Everybody move (dance)... Let's go to the moon... Eat some Keemo cake... Turn in a circle... Second Grade, along with our upper elementary students, learned about a musician named Mickey Guyton. If you watch the Super Bowl this weekend, you'll notice that she is the vocalist for the National Anthem! Our students listened to her song, "Black Like Me," and had really meaningful discussions about her achievements as a Black country music artist. Our second graders also learned a song about a taxi, and worked on their notation skills by putting the song's pattern onto a two-line staff. Then, they figured out how to play the song on the xylophones. It was a huge step in our learning to go from the two dimensional notes on the page to intentional sounds from an instrument! Third Grade this week focused on a song about Tennessee: Come my friend and go with me, remember me. Go with me to Tennessee, remember me. We added xylophones and traveled around the different xylophones in our classroom. Fourth Grade started our week by learning about canons (not cannons like, "boom!") with this little speech pattern: Two or more groups, do the same thing, but start, at different times. We also learned a song about an old sow named "Keemo" which had a game attached to it, and a Swedish dance named Fjaskern (translated: Hurry Scurry) - watch the videos to see one of our classes in action!
The fourth graders also had some guest dancers in one of our classes! Fifth Grade continued their ukulele unit this week by learning our first chords: C and F. Our students can now play three songs! As students play and sing their songs, they earn the opportunity to draw their name on the achievement poster.
This group of fifth graders insisted that if I was going to take their picture, they might as well dab! One of the activities in our Young Five's and Kindergarten classes this week was to read a book called Katy and the Big Snow by Virginia Lee Burton. We talked about the snow plows that went through Ann Arbor last week with our big snow! Then, we used our voices to follow the snow plow. In our second class, we created our own snow plow paths and sang them with our voices - check out some of our brave souls' performances below:
First Grade this week really focused on rhyming words. We "read" a book (in music class, that means we sang the words instead of reading them) called A-Hunting We Will Go and then played a game using that song except hunting rhyming words, we tried to identify instruments in our classroom by their sounds. It was so much fun! We also practiced our xylophone-playing and rhythm-playing skills using a song about snow. It was aptly timed due to all of the snow that we've been getting this year! Finally, we have been in school on a Monday or a Wednesday afternoon and the ukuleles made it into our students' hands! Check out our students below as they take the ukuleles off of the wall and practice their skills. Ukulele learning in the King music classroom looks very similar to how last year's students progressed through their recorder learning: students are responsible to work at their own pace through options of songs. We learn the chords together and practice each song as a class so everyone knows how it should sound, then the students have time to work independently (or with a partner/small group) until they are happy with their progress. Once they have met the criteria (correct fingering pattern on the neck, singing, strum pattern, etc) and perform it for me (individually or in small groups) then they can sign their name on the chord page and move to the next! My goal is for all students to learn at their own pace and comfort level, which means no one has to perform alone unless they want a solo. That's how students learn to be confident in their skill level and in our environment! Keep checking back as more pictures are uploaded above. Videos of the students in action can be seen below: The first ring of ukulele in the King Classroom, as we practice our C chord: Students and teacher sing the song together while playing: Student-led performance of playing and singing: As always, a massive "Thank you!" to the rotary club of ann arbor sponsors who helped to make the ukuleles a reality for our classroom. We are so grateful!This week, all of our lower elementary students learned about and celebrated the Lunar New Year. Happy New Year to all of our friends who celebrate! As a music teacher, it is incredibly important to me to celebrate holidays and festivals that my students see in their homes and daily lives. A large population of our school body celebrates the Lunar New Year, so we took a whole week to explore this amazing holiday. However, we do share our cultures with each other during every class, so this is by no means the only time we celebrate our friends with Asian heritage. Our youngest learners read a book called The Rice in the Pot Goes Round and Round by Wendy Wan-Long Shang and illustrated by Lorian Tu. It was great practice to sing some basic words in Mandarin (grandma, grandpa, little sister, etc.) while singing a familiar song ("The Wheels on the Bus"). We also made sure to take some movement breaks when we were learning during our "snow days" of virtual learning - check out our students sleeping during "Everybody, everybody, take a little nap!" Our older learners focused on learning about the Lunar New Year through some of the many traditions and rituals, including scrolls with well-wishes, fireworks, and red envelopes. We talked about how many Chinese families give children money in the envelopes, but that not all who celebrate Lunar New Year give money. Then we learned about a song sung in China called "Gong Xi," which many of our students were familiar with and helped us learn! Many classes could be heard singing, "Gong Xi" as they walked through the hall (when we had school early in the week).
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March 2024
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